Cause of Teresa, Catholic Herald, 25th October 1936

CAUSE OF TERESA HIGGINSON

A New Movement in London

The Catholic teachers of the Metropolitan district are now organising on a par with their compeers in the North and Midlands, to seek the Beatification of Teresa Higginson as " Patron of School-teachers."

A general committee with several branch sub-committees has been formed, and associates are being enrolled in all parts of Greater London. The Training Colleges, St. Mary's and St. Charles's, and the Mount Pleasant Association of London, are joining in the work, which is actively promoted by the several congregations directing them.

Among the officials are the recently elected President of the National Federation of Catholic Teachers; and the Vice-President of the Sirnmarian (St. Mary's) Association. At the first meeting of the General Committee, Mr. W. J. Ridge (hon. sec. of the M.C.T.A.), was elected as its president.

A Forthcoming Meeting

A meeting in Westminster Cathedral Hall (with the blessing and support of the Archbishop), is being prepared. The Vice Postulator, Mgr. O'Brien, of Bootle. Liverpool, will attend and give an account of the progress of the cause; and Lady Cecil Kerr of Edinburgh, Teresa's biographer and advocate, has promised to give an address. Representatives from the other local committees above-mentioned are expected to be present.

The movement in the Metropolis has been no doubt quickened by an address from Mgr. Thomas Adamson, secretary of the Archbishop of Liverpool. To the teachers of the archdiocese, he congratulated them on taking up the work so sincerely and enthusiastically, but adding:

"There will be difficulties. It is not an easy matter to get the Church formally to declare a person a saint. Witnesses have to be interviewed, documents and writings have to be collected and examined, the votes of theologians, bishops, and cardinals taken, before the Holy Father makes his final decision. Consequently, you must not expect to ace your efforts crowned with success within a few months. Moreover, in addition to the delay unavoidable in the formal process, you must not expect to be entirely free from irritations and vexations at home.

You will have criticism, plenty of it, as every good cause has. Much of it you will be able to ignore. On the other hand a kindly offer to explain the difficulties to your critics may often convert them to your cause. Personally I believe that the majority of the critics of Teresa Higginson are those who know least about her. Though we do not wish for a moment to anticipate the decision of the Church and assert definitely that she is truly a saint, nevertheless the fact that the authorities of the archdiocese have officially supported the Cause and have already forwarded it to Rome for examination is sufficient to justify our credibility."

United Efforts

There can be little doubt that these united efforts of the North and the South will encourage the advocates of this Cause in hoping to bring it to a successful issue at a not too distant date. It is also encouraging that interest in Teresa Higginson and her alleged revelations, is spreading rapidly all over the world. In the United States two of the Cardinal Archbishops, those of Boston and Philadelphia, like our own Archbishops are stimulating the eagerness of the Faithful to see Teresa beatified.

Teresa's meditiations on the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary - Fourth Mystery

Soul of a sinner - here without a home,
Art thou a pilgrim for the world to come?

See, then, thy Great Exemplar on His way
A path of dolours - cloth'd in red array!

The sight of Calvary His heart inspires
And lights eternal love with ardent fires.

Lo! where His Holy Mother stands opprest,
The sword of sorrow piercing through her breast!

See where the Cross - that purchase of the Crown

Weighs on His wounded frame, and sinks it down!

See when yon woman wipes His sacred face,

And wins a likeness of the King of Grace!

Hear where the daughters of sad Salem wail,

While Siloa's brook sighs softly through the vale;

These with sweet sympathy dissolve'd in fears,

That to be shortly swollen with their tears!

Lord! let each eye o'erflow with contrite grief,

And in the road to Calvary, seek relief!

Teresa's meditiations on the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary - Fifth Mystery

Soul of a sinner - turn with me once more
Upon a scene excelling all before!

And as the mighty Moses, when he saw
The Burning Bush with overwhelming awe,

Put off his shoes before the fire of God,
That he might worship on the sacred sod;

So thou from sin, and self, and sense set free,
Ascend the Holy Hill of Calvary!

Behold the Cross, in wreaths of sable furl'd,
The atoning Altar of a guilty world!

Look on thy Jesus in His final hour,
Till the look thrills thee with transforming power:

Hear His last words - the prayer - the bitter cry
That rends the Veil - and rocks the earth and sky:

Lo! how He Bows - when He resigns His breath,
That Head - which holds the crown of life and death.

And now the spear hath pierc'd His rifted side,
Whence flows for sinful man a double tide:

Oh! Glorious Cross! the "Tree of Lover" art Thou!
To Thee I kneel - beneath Thy shade I bow:

To Him - whom thou didst lift from earth to heaven;
Be my whole heart in sweet affection given!

Report on retreat on Teresa Higginson held at Pantasaph retreat centre

Recently a retreat was held at Pantasaph in North Wales from 28th - 30th June 2013. 

REPORT OF TERESA HIGGINSON RETREAT AT PANTASAPH 28th - 30th JUNE 2013

A group of twenty-one people interested in the promotion of the Devotion to the Sacred Head of Jesus, Seat of Divine Wisdom, as revealed to the nineteenth century Servant of God, Teresa Higginson, met at Pantasaph Monastery from June 28-30, under the chairmanship of Fr Keith Windsor OFM. Some of the group shared their particular interests in the background to the devotion. Several spoke of their long standing inherited family interest. It was explored that throughout Church history, the role of chosen souls given extraordinary gifts of the Holy Spirit at times when the culture required heavenly intervention:witness St Margaret Mary Alocoque and the Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The group prayed theprayers and litanies to the Sacred Head of Jesus during this dedicated retreat. 

This was an inaugural meeting which realised that as the Sacred Head Devotion is not yet accepted into the Cultus of the Church it must therefore remain Private Devotion. The group felt that the acceptance of the Devotion would enhance Teresa Higginson’s Cause and the two together will be a means of evangelisation to save souls. 

Teresa Higginson (1844-1905) was privileged to receive many visions, favours and private revelations from Our Lord. As early as Good Friday 1874, Jesus requested His Sacred Head be universally worshipped as the Seat of Divine Wisdom as a completion of the Devotion to His Sacred Heart and given as an antidote to the intellectual pride and increasing dominance of the scientific rationalism of her times. This makes itespecially timely today when the secularist agenda never ceases in its efforts to overshadow, drown out and intimidate the Christian witness to the moral truth of the Natural Law of God. 

Teresa was born and baptised in Holywell, North Wales, third child of eight, into a middle class pious family. Her precocious holiness was recognised by Blessed Dominic Barberi and Fr Ignatius Spencer, both frequent visitors to the family whose home was the local Mass centre in Gainsborough, Lincs. After Teresa spent ten years in a Convent in Nottingham, the family experienced financial hardship and moved to the North West, eventually settling in Neston on the Wirral, where Teresa was buried in the family grave at St Winefride’sChurch. Teresa stepped in to teach at St Alexandra’s Bootle during an outbreak of cholera and subsequently qualified as a teacher. In all her teaching positions, Teresa was a shining example of how to be holy whilst living as a lay person in the world. She was commanded under obedience by her spiritual director Fr Edward Powell of St Alexandra’s Bootle to give a detailed written account of her hidden life. This continued under her next director Canon Alfred Snow for the last twenty two years of her life. Canon Snow believed that she would eventually be proved to be one of the greatest Saints of the Church. 

There is much literature detailing the many extraordinary charismatic gifts given by God to Teresa Higginson: prophecy, bilocation, the stigmata, healings, ecstasies, mystical Communions, living almost completely on the Eucharist. She was frequently physically attacked by Satan hence the title of the most recent biography- The Devil in Bootle by Richard Whittington Egan. The definitive biography by Lady Cecil Kerr entitled Teresa Helena Higginson originally published in 1927 has recently been reprinted with an introduction by Rev Dr Paul Haffner, a Theology Professor in Rome. So much information about Teresa Higginson and the Devotion to the Sacred Head of Jesus is available on the Internet, an excellent website being www.sacredhead.org which provides links to the official information channel and www.teresahigginson.blogspot.co.uk and Facebook etc. Cecil Kerr’s book may be read online through links on these sites. 

Teresa’s Cause was presented to Rome in 1937 and declared Non-Expedire in 1938 but is still listed at the 

Vatican in the Causes of Saints and may be opened at a future date. The devotees pray that if it is God’s Will, the Church will soon absorb the Devotion to the Sacred Head of Jesus, Seat of Divine Wisdom and God Willing, Teresa’s time will have come.